I am not sure that was his only message here, or that it was his message at all.

actually, i think his message is that he's seen one too many crystal shop and/or met one too many 'whatever feels good' type of person. despite his premise, i think you all have put a lot more thought into religion than he has. i mean, he's ranting about governments assessing happiness, which is really not related to religion. (yes, i suppose religion can make you happy, but you can also be extremely religious and very unhappy, in part because you realized how much people, yourself included, fail to live up to religious ideals).

basically, he's pissed off that all those young hippies are focusing on being happy and not on following the rules because dammit, a civilization needs an organizing principle!

also, he wants to be able to walk on the beach without all those grungy-looking guys 'meditating' right where he wants to walk._________________aka: neverscared!

Joined: 09 Jul 2006Posts: 9702Location: I have to be somewhere? ::runs around frantically::

Posted: Tue Oct 02, 2012 2:52 am Post subject:

So we have been discussing this for like 4 pages so I finally got around to reading the article that started it all. My reaction - all I can think of is a little kid eating dinner going "No! The food can't touch each other! That's gross!"_________________Before God created Las he pondered on all the aspects a woman might have, he considered which ones would look good super-inflated and which ones to leave alone.
After much deliberation he gave her a giant comfort zone. - Michael

all I can think of is a little kid eating dinner going "No! The food can't touch each other! That's gross!"

I'm twenty-six, married, and I own a stack of divided plates because sometimes, certain foods touching is gross._________________“Yields falsehood when preceded by its quotation”
yields falsehood when preceded by its quotation.

I end up mixing so many foods. For things that don't fit I use multiple little plates when eating/serving. Lasairfiona and Mouse make good points though for how I see this guy.

Sam the Eagle wrote:

Adyon wrote:

"Social norms to easily fit in", as you said, can be subjective to an area. To cling to old ideals and practices of Buddhism while embracing Christianity's doctrine works for them.

Are we talking about faith or about moral values here?. The main cause of flak atheists receives is how lacking of morals they are because they do not adhere to a faith. Christianity, like all major religions, had to "interpret" some previous tenets to fit in locally; has to fit politics in many cases (e.g Nicea's council on "consubstanliatity"). In many cases, like Japaneses or Koreans taking up Christianity, there is a lot more to cover than moral values that better fit one's taste to consider. That would derail this thread though imho.

It's a bit mix of faith and moral values I speak of, but really I mean in the sense that religion can affect customs and traditions. In this case, we'd see a lot more Buddhist traditions, while adhering to Christian beliefs, in the same way the Japanese still visit Shinto shrines for various purposes ranging from festivities to paying respects and making wishes even while being Christians. I don't pretend to fully know the mindset though, as all my knowledge has been second hand from friends I've made that practiced such ways of believing or from classes containing the subject. Maybe someday I'll get to travel, but for now discussion is my only means. I agree though that going off on the path you mention would start to derail the thread farther. Probably best saved for elsewhere.

Feiticeira wrote:

CTrees wrote:

Honestly I've always found the assertion that atheists are inherently less moral than religious folk to be telling. I mean, if that were true, it would mean that the religious types were only being nice because they wanted to avoid punishment, not because they're simply good people.

and there's no limit to how violent or wicked a person can be when they believe they doing God's good work.

So basically our end result is...people are inclined to be dicks. If you scare/reward them, they will learn to be less of a dick. Give them enough power together and they'll be an even worse collection of dicks, now magnified by their collective dick-ittude._________________

I may be 'spiritual' vaguely in the sense that I think that there is one thing that points to a greater tangibility of the self than exists in our corporeal forms, and that's the mystery of any individual agent having a perspective they cannot really explain; people get at it by saying stuff like "why am I me? why was I born me?" — oh, yeah, the typical boring mystery of individual consciousness. It's almost universally pointless to wonder that much about, because the part of it which makes me wonder is pretty impossible to answer and no individual can prove to any other individual that they even have it. But it still makes me think that something must be going on.

Bonus about the epistemology of the mystery is that it appears very compellingly unanswerable, so I can for the most part disregard any spiritual/spiritualist claim to an answer.

A while ago (about middle school after several disastrously failed attempts by my "friends" to drag me kicking and screaming into the church) I realized that nobody will ever have all of the answers. I chose to believe in questions instead. Questions won't lie. They can, at worst, mislead or be the wrong question for any given situation... but they don't lie. They will ultimately lead you towards learning more. You can't just give up on the questions at that point, though, because sometimes answers change. So, I may not be able to know everything, but as long as I keep asking questions I'll know everything I can at any given time and that is better than knowing nothing at all.

Interestingly, most of the questions that are most important to me have nothing to do with religion. I consider it a belief system none the less.

Actually one of the aspects about the mystery of individual consciousness I explained is that legitimately nothing else can really be learned about it, barring an unexpected and radical change in empirical limitations of consciousness. Which is .. convenient. If I ever think I have discovered more about it, I have either gained magic extrasensory abilities or have begun to lose rational faculty to the extent that I have become more impressionable to delusional or fantastical thinking. (you can guess which is more likely)

There are literally no more questions to be asked of it, save to wonder how it could be better described in philosophical terms. Which is kind of useful, because it means that it's just a wait and see thing and in the meanwhile I don't have to worry about anything other than humanist propositions as life goals and philosophical ideals, lessening the suffering of others, and striving to know more at the end of any given day than I knew at the start.

It's a bit mix of faith and moral values I speak of, but really I mean in the sense that religion can affect customs and traditions. In this case, we'd see a lot more Buddhist traditions, while adhering to Christian beliefs, in the same way the Japanese still visit Shinto shrines for various purposes ranging from festivities to paying respects and making wishes even while being Christians. I don't pretend to fully know the mindset though, as all my knowledge has been second hand from friends I've made that practiced such ways of believing or from classes containing the subject. Maybe someday I'll get to travel, but for now discussion is my only means. I agree though that going off on the path you mention would start to derail the thread farther. Probably best saved for elsewhere.

I've posted here parts of my background so others knows this already, but just so you're sure I'm not bullshiting you: I spent 5y in the country, my wife is Japanese and we go back there yearly if we can.

Japaneses have, by and large, a tendency -not- to be spiritual when it suits them. To clarify: As with education, where parents think that since they're paying good money to the school, it's the teach' business to educate/raise them, so is belief where as long as they give money to said religion, it's said religion business to save/whatsnot they soul. Beyond this, they don't give any further thought going to this or that church, be it Shinto temple for birth, Buddhist temple for death, or marrying in a Christian church. I've been best boy to a friend who is buddhist who were going to marry a protestant (very rare in Japan btw) japanese girl and the groom followed the ritual dutifully. At the same time, like a lot of Asians, they believe a lot in spiritual powers, and are superstitious to an unbelieveable extend (just ask your friend about the fortune telling based on rhesus).

Whatever it may looks like to you, they see nothing odd with that. Hence my princess bride line in the previous post._________________Meu aerobarca esta cheoi de enguias

Ah yeah, I get what you were coming at. I was just clarifying what I meant to, as you seemed unsure what I meant by my previous statement, or at least what I was referring to.

For sure though, the Japanese put a lot overall time in the "spirituality" as much as they incorporate what is practical. Really, the US would be a lot better off it was just willing to be a bit more practical too. If religion wasn't an overwhelming thing that destroyed some people's reason, it could just be a part of their lives how they chose, but we wouldn't focus on it politically, etc.

It's interesting but, I think all this would go back to that article and see how much of an issue the guy would take with Japanese society. That's probably why it first came to mind when I was thinking of that article. Sure, they have religions, but it doesn't matter as much. They think in practicality. They think of life-force energy and crazy myths and legends. Really this is a lot of Asian countries. I've seen master martial artists who study and use chi techniques, and it's legitimately terrifying how supernatural they seem to become. That they developed acupuncture, and so many other things that sound silly to westerners (or at least many westerners) that work shows that they think outside the box in unique ways, but they use everything they do so well.

I think my obsession with the Asian cultures is starting to show. I envy you getting to go over there regularly. My wife and I have been wanting to go for forever. We think if we were going to live somewhere else, it would probably be Australia, close to Asian countries, yet not quite as different of a living environment than we're used to._________________

In the Venn Diagram of American politics, where the circles of crimson and blue overlap, there’s a place where you and I meet. It’s a place where guys who cling to their religion, rights, and guns, connect with godless, clinched-fist-tattoo, guys.

That comma placement actually makes that sentence really hard to read, though it might make sense if 'godless' were more commonly used as a noun.

I tried reading the rest of that letter, but I wasn't able to get through it.
It reminds me a lot of that one time I tried writing a 'friendly' letter about a point of philosophical contention I had with someone I didn't particularly like, though I was making a feeble attempt at liking them. It 'subtly' and 'gently' supported my own ignorant opinion whilst laying on thick the false camaraderie and supposed common ground.

Who wouldn't be glad to know Glenn Beck and their past self had so much in common, eh?_________________butts